Comparative Analysis of Black Lives Matter & Civil Rights Movement

History of racism against African Americans

The civil rights movement in America started against the racial discrimination of the African people in order to provide them equal treatment, it was a kind of social justice for Black Americans to acquire equality status and rights under the said legislation in the United States. Whereas the Balck lives movement was also initiated with the aim to redress the growing atrocities and murders against the African Americans and to implement proper laws for granting them equal rights as well as protection (Clayton, 2018). The following paper highlights the comparative analysis of the Black lives matter and the civil rights movement, followed by a conclusion.

In past America has continuously mistreated the Africans, system of slavery was introduced in America where the African s were captured to work as slaves, later slavery was legalized which made the African people be a property for life (Hannah-Jones, 2019). For the colonist Africans became slaves and thus began the era of slavery where many atrocities were committed on the Africans, with President Abraham Lincoln freeing the slaves in the most rebellious state, his assassination ignited more among African-American to oppose slavery, thus began the oppression of Black Americans throughout the United States and thus was converted into the Civil rights movement to end the existing racism.

The people started protesting as a result, the protests or the civil disobedience comprised of boycotts, sit-ins, and mass marches (Mazumdar, 2018).  One famous protest was the Montgomery Bus boycott in 1956 among others such as Greensboro sit-ins, and Nashville sit-ins in which became successful including an extended scope of non-violent campaigns and hostility, where the African Americans boycotted the Montgomery Alabama Bus system for over a year and the local bus company accepted to desperate its buses due to the severe losses (Schmidt, 2018).

The black lives matter protests came alive again in the wake of the murder of African-American George Floyd by the brutality of the American police officer Derek Chauvin, following the protests in 2020 which created civil unrest among the entire Minneapolis and the related organizations advocated for the policy changes and the related to the liberation of the Black. The protests under this comprised of the marches firstly in the state of Minneapolis, which quickly spread nationwide for supporting the Black lives matter movement (Cappelli, 2020). Protest mostly comprised of the riots, lootings, street skirmishes, which included the curfew, while the majority of the protest were quite peaceful, which followed the candle marches along with slogans.

Civil Rights Movement

Moreover, the protests led to the creation of policies and laws against police misconduct and to remove racial bias, as a result of the Justice in Policing Act 2020 that aims to combats police misconduct, excessive force, and racial bias. Both the civil rights and the Black lives matter movements were related to ending the racism against the African-Americans and granting them equal status so that their identity can be maintained. Another, Act that was implemented was the George Floyd Law Enforcement Trust and Integrity Act which aimed at implementing national policing standards and accreditations (Utari & Afrifin, 2020).

Generally, protests are of two types peaceful protests and non-peaceful protests, while peaceful protests are also termed as non-violent resistance which comprises of an act of expressing the sudden disapproval accompanied by an action without the use of violence of some law, policy, idea or the state of affairs. It comprises of candle marches, bus boycotts, persuasion, non-cooperation, while protests are in the form of non-violent actions, the protests during the civil rights movement were more peaceful and even the peaceful civil rights movements are violent as it is the violence that motivates the people to take action (Bethke & Pinckney, 2021).

 on the contrary, there are violent protests, comprising of riots, which creates the disturbance of the peace by assembling of three or more people acting with a common purpose and in a violent and harsh manner stating their dissatisfaction against any state action, law or policy, it involves the destruction of state property in the form of dissatisfaction thereby creating unrest in the entire area. Often violent or peaceful protests may not efficiently involve the support of the entire nation as it may scare away the potential allies making them threatened (Inazu, 2017).

Conclusion

Since the ancient era, the Africans are being continuously mistreated in the United States of America where they were treated as slaves resulting in the violation of their rights and freedoms, that began the civil rights movement began with the aim to end the racism, black lives matter protests came alive again after the murder of African-American George Floyd creating civil unrest and implementation of certain policy changes for the liberation of the black. The above paper highlighted the comparative analysis of the Black lives matter and the civil rights movement

References

Bethke, F. S., & Pinckney, J. (2021). Non-violent resistance and the quality of democracy. Conflict Management and Peace Science, 38(5), 503-523.

Cappelli, M. L. (2020). Black Lives Matter: The Emotional and Racial Dynamics of the George Floyd Protest Graffiti. Advances in Applied Sociology, 9(10), 323.

Clayton, D. M. (2018). Black lives matter and the civil rights movement: A comparative      analysis of two social movements in the United States. Journal of Black Studies, 49(5), 448-480.

Hannah-Jones, N. (2019). America wasn’ta democracy, until Black Americans made it one. The New York Times Magazine, 14-26.

Inazu, J. (2017). Unlawful assembly as social control. UCLA L. Rev., 64, 2.

Mazumder, S. (2018). The persistent effect of US civil rights protests on political attitudes. American Journal of Political Science, 62(4), 922-935.

Schmidt, C. W. (2018). The Sit-In Movement. In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of American History.

Utari, I. S., & Arifin, R. (2020). Law Enforcement and Legal Reform in Indonesia and Global Context: How the Law Responds to Community Development?. Journal of Law and Legal Reform, 1(1), 1-4.

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